Business Essentials Package

What is Business Essentials?

Our most popular package is FSB Business Essentials which includes a whole range of benefits and products designed to make your business fly

What's included?

A suite of legal benefits including a dedicated helpline, bundled insurance products and a range of online information to keep your business safe. Plus a whole range of negotiated benefits to help save you money and win business.

Chris Green's Story

'Within a few weeks of joining we'd taken advantage of FSB’s Online Legal Documents. We started a graduate programme and access to these documents gave us an understanding of the legal side, and has helped us to create a number of processes and procedures.'

Marc Wileman's Story

'When we first took on a member of staff, we used the online legal document template library. FSB does more important stuff than you think it does, there are lots of member benefits, probably more than we actually use.'

How much does FSB membership cost?

We offer three packages to suit your business needs. Joining FSB Connect is free, our Business Essentials package starts at £172.50 in the first year and our specialist Business Creation package has a fixed price of £129.

Five low cost, low time marketing ideas for the small business owner

Small business owners don’t always have the time or the resources to sit down and plan an extensive plan to bring in new customers – so, what’s the alternative?

In this article, we have gathered five key ways your business can start to ‘do’ marketing without any great preparation or planning.

These ideas have been taken from a range of different marketing strategies and while they seem varied, what unites them is that they’ll cost you very little in terms of expense or time.

Go social

A huge amount of time can be spent working up social strategies and producing content, so why not just experiment with a few ideas instead? What about themed photos, pictures of happy customers? Or time-sensitive and limited offers exclusively for your social followers?

If you find something that resonates – keep doing it.

It’s also important to build your audience. So, start with family and friends, then look out for people who are socially active in your area of business and follow them – they might help generate even more followers for you.

Giveaways

People love free stuff. And why do so many businesses run giveaways and offers? Because it encourages interest and helps bring trade further down the line. So, think about what you could giveaway that won’t break the bank or take all day, but will get new people thinking about your business.

Bakers, for instance, why not prepare some delicious chocolate croissants and stand outside your shop during the morning commute so people can get a taster on their way to work?

A giveaway doesn’t just have to be a taster of your products. It could also be you giving over some space to a community group or pop-up business that will bring new people through the door.

Network

Marketing isn’t all leaflets and giveaways, sometimes you’re going to have to get out there and talk to people. It will cost you no more than the price of a bus ticket to travel to a networking event and the time it takes you to do the rounds.

Find smaller, free face-to-face networking events for i) businesses in your area ii) businesses in your sector – and then set yourself a goal of talking meaningfully to at least three people before you leave.

Networking is a great way to get your name out there, grow your reputation, and build important business ties that help you grow your business. It’s also a good for refining your business pitch.

Simple emailing

Encourage people to join your mailing list by offering a monthly prize draw in return for an address or, simply, ask customers for their address so you can keep them up to speed with what you’re doing.

Once you have a good handful of addresses, get set up with an email marketing service. MailChimp is a good one and, like most others, it has a simple-to-use service that allows you to send up to 12,000 emails per month for free if you have 2,000 or fewer subscribers. That works out as 12 emails a month if you have 1,000 contact or six a month if you have 2,000. The fewer contacts you have, the more emails you can send.

Most email services also offer a range of templates, so your emails can look good without you having to invest lots of time or effort. Simply, upload your contacts, write your email, and send – then you’ll be underway with your new email marketing programme!

Partner with a local business or club

Is there a local firm that offers a complimentary but not competitive business to yours?

If you sell soft furnishings for the home, then what about approaching the local furniture shop to see if you can offer deals to each other’s customers or, at the very least, drive business back and forth with cross-promotion?

You could have their furniture in your shop and your rugs and cushions on the furniture in their location.